{"id":1454,"date":"2026-03-24T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-03-24T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pbump.net\/o\/?p=1454"},"modified":"2026-03-24T08:16:22","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T12:16:22","slug":"opening-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pbump.net\/o\/opening-day\/","title":{"rendered":"A review of 2,871 Opening Days \u2014 and the seasons that followed"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Relatively few Americans care anymore, but Thursday is baseball’s Opening Day. For fans like myself, baseball’s annual return plays a role not dissimilar to the role of the equinox in prehistoric days: a celebration of rebirth, of spring, of a glimmer of positivity after a long stretch of pessimism. It is one of the few days during the year, too, when it is still possible for the New York Yankees to go 0-and-162, as they deservedly should.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

History suggests they won’t. In fact, history suggests that they’re likely to win their first game of the season (a day early, against the San Francisco Giants on Wednesday). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

See, because my schedule is rather light these days<\/a>, I decided to see whether the first day of the baseball season actually told us anything. Using the game-by-game data available at Retrosheet<\/a>, I pulled each franchise’s Opening Day record for as far back as they have been playing ball. The result was necessarily mottled; at least in the era of electric lights<\/a>, when one team wins on Opening Day, another team has to lose.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The longest stretch a team has gone in winning their first games of the year is ten seasons, a record held by both the Astros (2013 to 2022) and the Braves (1887 to 1896).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the time, the Braves were the Boston Beaneaters. And that pattern of Opening Day victories didn’t last; over the history of the franchise, the Braves have lost more Opening Day games than they’ve won. That’s true of 13 other major league franchises as well. The worst Opening Day winning percentage, though, belongs to the Royals. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The best? The Amazin’ New York Mets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Of course, there’s a difference between how a team fares on Opening Day and how it fares in its first home<\/em> game of each season. Just as Opening Day necessarily means that one team wins and one loses, it also means that one team is at home and one is on the road. If we look at how the teams have done in their home-stadium openers, the results are a bit better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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When looking at each franchise’s first home games, the win record jumps to 11 straight seasons \u2014 an accomplishment achieved, I regret to inform you, by the 1998 to 2008 New York Yankees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In fact \u2014\u00a0and I really<\/em> regret to inform you of this \u2014\u00a0the Yankees have the best overall record in first home games of any franchise. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Again, franchises usually have had more wins in their first home games than their first games of the season because home-field advantage is a thing. But that’s not universally true. Some franchises, like the Dodgers and Reds, have better Opening Day records than first-game-of-the-season records.<\/p>\n\n\n\n